Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: A Conversation on the Economic Crisis: How To Do It?

[Craig Ragland (craigragland]

So, it seems there's some interest in this... would voice-only be enough?

Other individuals or categories of people, you'd like to join as panelist?

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 10:44 AM, Raines Cohen <rc3-coho-L [at] raines.com> 
wrote:

>
> This is a very important topic, and I'm glad to see the Association
> responding to the need in the movement for attention to this area.
> While I'm deeply engaged in pre-election activities (including
> dovetailing some Get-Out-The-Vote work with a family wedding in a
> swing state), I'd be willing to take an hour out for an initial
> conversation, sooner rather than later, with an eye towards a larger
> series of conversations to follow after the election.
>
> I was just at the La Querencia cohousing grand opening in Fresno (CA)
> on Sunday, and while it was heartening to see the beautiful
> neighborhood risen from what was bare ground just fifteen months ago,
> and a vibrant set of members in the process of moving in, with
> cohousers from around the state gathering to show support, it was
> clear that even some longtime group members were unable to buy the
> units they had helped design -- because they couldn't sell their
> existing homes for the prices they expected.
>
> I understand that Silver Sage, the senior/elder cohousing neighborhood
> in Boulder, CO, had similar challenges when it was completed early
> this year, with some members dropping out for similar reasons. It is
> worth looking at the creative solutions members there explored and
> employed to keep people involved in the community: renting out rooms,
> joining as housemates or co-buyers.
>
> We can look to cohousing neighborhoods in cities that have already
> experienced economic challenges for models of coping with downturns:
> Touchstone in Ann Arbor, MI, for example, completed its initial phase
> just as the largest employer left town, leaving it unable to sell
> enough units to build the rest and pay for construction of a common
> house. Delaware Street Commons in Lawrence, Kansas, rented out a bunch
> of units that it couldn't easily sell. Mosaic Commons in
> Massachusetts, like many new communities, is needing to complete some
> cash sales to establish comparables before banks will rely on sale
> prices to establish value for providing individual homeowner
> mortgages. Even Doyle Street Cohousing in Emeryville, CA, the first in
> the San Francisco Bay Area, took more than a year to sell its last few
> units because it was completed just as a housing-market lull was
> happening in the early 90s, yet it went on to eventually sell (without
> discounting, to the best of my knowledge) and benefit from the rise
> over the decade that followed.
>
> Absolutely, times like these can lead to fear of commitment: on the
> part of group members, as well as the professionals we rely on:
> developers, lenders, even cities. But we can find ways to help people
> get over these barriers, tap resources they didn't know existed, and
> get motivated and supported to move further along the path to
> community. Nobody ever promised that the road to community would be a
> primrose-lined expressway, paved with silk... it can be a long and
> twisty road, with dragons lurking in hidden corners.
>
> Just as cohousing has benefited from its embrace of professional
> development and conventional mortgage lending, it will be affected by
> changes in the market, resource constraints, and external forces
> affecting market dynamics. As Terri mentions, at the core we're
> talking about Real Estate here, and location, location, location are
> paramount; some markets will face different dynamics, with different
> timing, moving opposite prevailing patterns.
>
> Cohousing seems to me to be well-positioned to thrive during down
> times in the economic cycle, _IF_ we can be effective at both
> understanding and communicating how it helps people live richer,
> simpler lives, in less space, with less stuff, using less energy, and
> learning more from and connecting more deeply with each other.
>
> At La Querencia this week, I had a brief conversation with a
> professional cohousing developer about the potential to create loan
> funds or other financing tools to help people buy cohousing units
> before they can sell their existing homes; perhaps something in the
> form of a silent second mortgage on both the old and the new homes, or
> an equity-sharing arrangement that provides for recapture of future
> appreciation.
>
> Betsy and I have already been working with a land-trust that is
> creating permanently-affordable cohousing, preparing to provide
> short-term bridge loans to advance down-payment assistance for the new
> first-time homebuyers there, backed up by commitments from a bank
> program (normally the member bank would cover the float, but they're
> experiencing their own well-publicized challenges at the moment).
>
> And we and plenty of other cohousers have invested in the development
> of other cohousing projects.
>
> The potential is there, if we're willing to reach out and embrace the
> opportunity and collaborate to cocreate the tools that will get us
> through this.
>
> Raines Cohen, Cohousing Coach, Planning for Sustainable Communities
> http://www.CohousingCoach.com/
>
> at Berkeley (CA) Cohousing
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>
>
>


-- 
Craig Ragland

Coho/US executive director
http://www.cohousing.org
craig [at] cohousing.org

Please try email first, include your phone number (w/time zone) - or give me
a call: 425-487-3550 (Pacific)... communicate!